✽ trying to be a kinder and more understanding person doesn’t mean eradicating every feeling of anger and irritation you experience.

✽ never overextend yourself to be in someone’s life. Natural alignment is a real thing and what is for you will not pass you by.

✽ people who wait for you to tie your shoe. people who shift closer to you when you're subconsciously moving away while you're walking next to them. people who smile at you as soon as you make eye contact. people who seek you out to tell you some good news. people who listen to you and hear you and understand you. do not make the mistake of ever convincing yourself that everyone is a bad person when you yourself have done this and not even thought twice about it

✽ avoid being accessible all the time. Get off of social media, and away from others more often. Invest time in connecting with yourself and pay attention to what you need. Evaluate the things in life that are causing stress, and reconsider the value of them. Become your main priority.

✽ on loneliness:

• being lonely isn’t bad. we’re hardwired to want touch and emotional connection. being lonely is human.
• everyone is lonely. the girl on the bus. the guy who’s posting his amazing life on instagram. the celebrity, the friend, the parent, the popular, the shy, the cat, everybody. yet few people would admit it or even say the word. no one is too good for loneliness.
• loneliness isn’t something bad. avoiding it is like avoiding sadness or anger; it will manifest into addiction, desperate attempts at crumbs of connection. feel loneliness in its purest form. maybe it’s an ache, a thirst in your throat, a colour of anxiety. sit with it. mother it.
• when you’re lonely and truly have no one, everything will be warmth. everything will be a friend. from the houseplant you’re nurturing, to the chamomile tea in your body, your bed, the guitar in your arms. this too is a full life. a good one. a precious one.
• loneliness will tell you to reach out. that you’re okay and it’s a matter of timing. or it will tell you you’re repulsive, unloveable and weird. loneliness is a child, an emotion. it tries to make sense of its painful situation with both truth and lies. not everything should be believed. but not everything is unwise.
• your needs are important, and if you can’t reach out to a physical being, reach out into an outlet: music, writing, art, nature. make your mugs and pillows your friend. make your books your friend. if it comforts you, have it in your life as much as possible.

✽ I get deeply tired because everything touches me, I am never indifferent — The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 2: 1934-1939

✽ having hobbies, connecting w others, laughing and smiling and dancing and having a good time, reaching out in place of turning inward, being in love w a person and my friends and the world, nourishing my soul and heart and mind, eating good food, being part of this world—all these things really are so much better than digging my own grave and trying to make a home out of it

✽ y’know as much as self-sacrifice gets made out to be super noble and shit in a lot of fiction, i am. very much more in favor of the message “you can live. you can want to live. it is a good thing to want to live, and it is a good thing that you are alive. you don’t have to feel guilty for being alive.”

✽ for everyone with social anxiety, this is a reminder that you don't have to be perfect in your interactions with others; you just have to be kind and that's literally it. That's all that's necessary of you. You don't need to say the perfect thing or anticipate what they would want you to say or even exude confidence if you can't. don’t hate urself, hate the system that made u feel insecure about every single aspect of ur life

✽ to name just a few that I’ve personally dealt with

• it’s ok to be living with your family over the age of 18
• it’s ok if you’ve never had a relationship, and if you still haven’t had your first kiss
• it’s ok to have cellulite. it’s ok to not to work out
• it’s ok not to have a huge friend group, or a big social media presence
• it’s ok if you’re not “conventionally” attractive bc that concept is made up!!!!
• it’s ok if you aren’t good at make up, and don’t want to be. it is not lazy for a women to go bare face.
• it’s ok if you didn’t go to parties and drink excessive amounts during high school, high school is so glamorized in tv and it’s not a true depiction. high school is NOT the best four years of your life. neither is college. you did not miss out.
• it’s ok to not know what you want to do, or change your ideas 1000 times. if you want to go back to school @ 28, do it. there is no age limit on education
• it’s ok to have body positivity for others but not yourself. you are growing.
• most importantly, you have time. you have time !!!

✽ when jenny slate said “when people get a glimpse of me i’d like them to feel like it is a good omen" ....... ❤

✽ it's time to kill the idea that we can only grow and heal when we're uncomfortable. You heal every time you have a good conversation with someone. You heal every time you laugh. You heal every time something makes you smile genuinely. You heal every time you have fun creating something - anything. You heal every time you get so absorbed in something fun that you forget your struggles for a while. There is, in fact, lots of healing and growth to be found INSIDE your comfort zone.

✽ you exist

✽ friendly reminder that moments like sitting in the sun, waking up well-rested, discovering a song that makes you feel your heart and laughing with someone will find you again. clouds will dissipate and the sun will sink and rise and the moon will be full and bright outside of your window, and life will stop feeling this heavy. in the meantime, we’ll try. sometimes that’ll feel like enough and sometimes it won’t, but that’s okay. you’re here and that’s an achievement and that’s good and it matters.

✽ even if i don’t like my body today i will take care of it. even if i don’t like myself today i will still be patient and kind with myself. even if i do not love myself i will still take care of and be kind to myself, despite not wanting to

✽ if you accidentally hurt someone or cross their boundaries and they make you aware of this, literally all you have to do is apologize and stop. you don't have to beat yourself up internally for months. You don't have to hate yourself for fucking up. you don't have to feel like a horrible person. no one benefits from any of that - and at worst, such an extreme reaction will make the person in question less likely to speak up around you in the future, cause even if your negative reaction is directed at yourself and not at them, it's still unpleasant for everyone involved.

✽ thinking about how life really is just about the little rituals we set up for ourselves. a long shower to wash off the day's hardships. peeling your orange in the morning before you rush to catch the bus. watering your plants, noting the changes of the soil, of the leaves. those moments that we give ourselves, the bubbles in our life where we allow ourselves to just breathe and exist. thinking about how those moments are laced with intention. i am taking care of myself, of my environment, of my body. i am nourishing my heart my soul my mind. because i deserve to love and i deserve to be loved.

✽ all that you touch, you change. all that you change, changes you.

✽ the cure to self-sabotage is to anchor yourself to the universal truth that you are worth it. you are worth the effort. you are worth the difficulty, you are worth the time, you are worth the consideration. there is never a point in your life, in time itself, that you are not worth it. return to this truth when you feel yourself slipping. do not let it go.

✽ it’s easy for hobbies to turn into things we avoid because of the pressure we put on ourselves. but i promise, u have nothing to prove. if u enjoy drawing, draw!! it doesn’t have to be museum worthy. ur baking doesn’t need to be master chef worthy every time you do it. hobbies are hobbies because they make you happy and u enjoy doing them. there is no pressure for u to become a professional in everything u enjoy; enjoy it for the lack of pressure. try and let yourself participate in things without tying ur worth to the final products. if it makes you happy, anything that comes from that is worth it.

✽ if you remember that life is fluid you’ll never feel stuck. nothing is the end all or your only option. when something ends it’s your time to start something new. it doesn’t matter how often doors close if you’re always moving forward. don’t dwell or try to open those old doors. the more you keep moving, the more you’ll see life is working in your favor.

✽ tired of science and love being poised as opposites or science being painted as cold/unfeeling there is literally nothing more loving than wanting to understand something

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